'It was like the Olympics of gas' at Hartman Chevron

Dave Dieter/The Huntsville TimesLong lines down Madison Street were the norm at Hartman Chevron after the storms.

HUNTSVILLE, Alabama - Things are back to normal now at Hartman Chevron on Madison Street. Regular customers filter in and out of the station, and there is no longer any need to direct traffic.

But all was chaos for five days after the tornadoes of April 27. It was "like the Olympics of gas," in the words of Sherl Hirschler, the manager of the station.

For those five days, Hartman Chevron dispensed 36,000 gallons of gas - a load of gasoline a day, by the estimate of Hartman Hirschler, Sherl's husband.

Most months, the station sells about 30,000 gallons of gas, he said. Most days, the station sells about 1,000 gallons of gas.

But the end of April and the start of May aren't like most months.

And April 28, the day after the tornadoes, is unlike any day the Hirschlers have had since Hartman moved his Chevron station to Madison Street in 1981.

"I couldn't get in my own place (that day)," Hartman Hirschler said.

Until the day after the tornadoes, Hartman Chevron was best-known as the last full service gas station in Huntsville with a garage.

But on the day after the tornadoes, Hartman Chevron was more widely known as perhaps the only gas station open in Huntsville, running off Hartman Hirschler's 16-horsepower Onan generator that "can light up this block," he said.

That day and the following three or four days, the Hirschlers saw people crying for gas, people arguing because of gas, people cussing and making threats because of gas.

At one time, they said, four policemen were at the station. Employees of Huntsville Hospital were directing traffic by the station and on adjacent roads.

The line stretched along Governors Drive and Madison Street, then on to St. Clair and Lowe avenues, then up Franklin Street and down Rands Avenue

Some waited for nine hour to get gas on the day after the tornadoes, by the Hirschlers' estimate.

"It's like the Olympics when you go as fast as you can," Sherl said. "We were pumping all 10 pumps with six people. It was three days, Saturday evening, before there was any self-service."

There was no self service for three days, she said, because of repeated drive-offs.

"You wouldn't believe the people with bad credit cards," Hartman said. "They'd pull off to the side (after getting gas), get on their cell phone and act like they were calling somebody for money.

"When we weren't looking, they took off."

Customers desperate for gas began gathering at the front of the station with gas cans in hand.

By and by, there were so many people with gas cans, said the Hirschlers, that the walk-up customers were blocking motorists trying to leave the station.

Others began backing their cars into the station.

"They'd push their car into the station and fill their cars up with gas cans," Hartman Hirschler said. "They would push their cars in against the traffic. You couldn't control it."

Finally, Hartman Hirschler stopped allowing gas cans.

"One lady said she would sit across the street and if we put gas in somebody's can somebody was going to get hurt," he said. "She was hovering around to see if we put gas in a can."

Ultimately, things began to calm late last Monday afternoon, when power had returned for much of the area.

That day, the Hirschlers tried to pay for three loads of gas with $90,000 in cash, all crammed in a large box. But their oil distributor was unwilling to accept such a large amount of cash, and their bank was also anxious about taking so much cash.

Even the $90,000 in cash didn't cover their gas bill from the aftermath of the storms, the Hirschlers said. The multiple drive-offs cost them about $1,300, and there was the gas price increase from the distributor in the days afterward.

"Everything happened so quick that we didn't get a bill for (the loads) because of the tornadoes," Hartman Hirschler said. "When we got a bill the following Monday, the gas had gone up on us 15 cents.